greysmom

Oh, my!! It is very scary! We had a 2 yr old Great Dane that Bloat/torsion surgery. Fortunately we caught it is time and she recovered and went on to live a normal and long life. The symptoms I look for are unproductive dry heaves, or vomiting with little or no output beyond a little yellow bile, a "humped up" posture indicating abdominal pain, whining and biting at mid-section, indications of shock such as glassy eyes and pale gums, racing heartbeat and panting. It used to be that feeding from the floor was a no-no, and/or eating and drinking large amounts soon after hard exercise. I believe the current thinking is that genetics play a larger role, and that feeding from raised feeders is now considered a factor. Stress seems to also figure in. Plus the ratio of length-to-width of a breed's chest/abdomen - which is why sight hounds and other dogs shaped like sight hounds are at higher risk for bloat/torsion. The squarer the dog the less risk of bloat. In my Alex's case, she had a littermate die from bloat and another brother survived - so three pups from her litter had it. Her father (a champion show dog and prolific sire) also died from bloat while an experienced dog sitter was taking care of him while his owners were on vacation. Frisco was a beautiful dog and a lot of Great Dane owners were shocked by his passing. Here's prayers for Johnny and hoping he has a happy ending, too!!!!! greysmom

Dude is always hot. I've always thought it had something to do with his out-of-whack thyroid rather than being big or black. Plus he's really got a very thin to non-existent hair coat, so the extra internal heating is needed most of the time. He doesn't necessarily pant overmuch, but his normal temp is definitely higher than "normal." I've taken to sleeping on top of the bed with no covers even in the winter as he's a major snuggle bug, too. Fortunately, he loves the wading pool in summer and chewing ice cubes year round. greysmom

The Dude takes 1.2 in the morning and .8 in the evening. He's due for a recheck soon though, so we'll see what's what. He's been on this dosage for a year. I was wondering - Dude is always really warm, as in, hot water bottle warm in winter and way too warm to cuddle with in bed in the summer. His body temp is at around 102 consistently. I also have trouble keeping weight on him, part of which I attribute to his hyper personality, but wonder if it's due to an out-of-whack thyroid. He has the typical bald tummy, neck and butt to go along with everything else. Anybody else's grey this way? greysmom

Sounds like your doing it fine. If you're concerned about licking while you're away you can always put his basket muzzle on. OR, you could try your "boot" (probably w/o the sock) as long as it's not too tight and air can still circulate. Good luck! greysmom

Sometimes it can take several weeks to level out. You may also have to adjust their dosage. My vet said that, like with other Rx's, greys react differently and the usual dosage may be too much or too little. And the type of thyroid can make a difference as well. The Dude is on soloxine and it seems to be better for him than the levothyroxine. I'd talk to your vet and see if an adjustment might be needed. greysmom

The longer you can do it, the better the healing will be. If you let her run on it too soon, she may dislocate it again, or break it - then you're looking at surgery. Obviously, this is going to depend on how easily Frannie heals, and how long you can keep her quiet. My Dude had his toe amputated last week and I caught him starting to run full speed on three legs today! It's incredible how they can adapt to it so fast! greysmom

I think I got the picture thing working. Here's The Dude!

Seeing if this works

Thanks, everybody! The Dude is home now and sleeping (completely unconscious) on his bed at my feet. The surgery went extremely well and, barring any splint and/or bandaging mishaps, he'll have his sutures removed in two weeks and should be absolutely fine thereafter. As expected, we're already having trouble keeping him quiet. He's a weenie, but he's a hyper weenie. The vet said we could renew his sedative prescription and I'm thinking I'll just by stock in the company! By the way, I finally have enough posts for an avatar now! The pic is our angel girl Libby (Everlast) who we lost in January to kidney failure. greysmom

Post-surgery update: Everything went well, but he's not coming home until tomorrow as they got a late start to the surgery. We're fixing him a nice comfy bed on the first floor and working out who's going to sleep in the living room with him for two weeks! Thanks for your support! greysmom

He's going to be fine, but he was so pathetic at the ER vet this morning. He's kind of a weenie anyway, so when he pulled out of the morning sprint training in the back yard I wasn't worried. He often retreats to the deck, out of the way, when he thinks the run is getting too physical (ie. he gets bumped a little bit). But he came limping up to get his treat and I could see one of his hind toes was bleeding. After waking up the hubby and cleaning it off I decided it was more than a stick poke and bundled him into the car. Though I think he was more concerned about not getting breakfast that how much his toe hurt! Well, of course he broke his third toe - fractured it to pieces actually - on his back right foot, so now he's waiting for his surgery later this afternoon! We hope he can come home tonight, but it depends on how he comes out of the anesthesia. So thinks good thoughts for The Dude! greysmom

And try to keep her quiet. I know it's hard with greys, but the wound needs a chance to heal and it can't if it keeps getting opened up. No long walks or running. She'll want to be on it way before she should. Cut back on her food if she's usually an active girl. Keeping it clean and dry is a priority - The sock trick usually works for us, plus a plastic produce bad if it's wet outside (keep it on with bandage tape or vet wrap, but remove it inside). Feet are so tricky! Good luck!! greysmom

What I did for my boy was to measure out how much kibble I fed him and then crushed it in the blender to kibble dust. I mixed the kibble dust with his normal amount of canned food and he ate it with no problems. This way he got the same amount of food he was used to but I didn't have to worry about him choking on kibble or waiting to feed him until it softened up. I just kept kibble dust on hand until he could eat again (he's lost quite a few teeth but still has most of his molars on one side). greysmom

Oh, yeah! My Dude does this at least 2 or 3 times a week. He'll be lying quietly and all of a sudden we get the pathetic screams and whimpers. He usually jumps up and walks it off on his own, but sometimes we have to massage his leg (usually a back one) if it's bad. The other two do it as well, but not nearly as often. greysmom

It's so, so hard to make that decision, and even when you know you did the right thing, you still have questions and wonder if you could have done anything more. I'm told it's normal and a part of grieving but that doesn't make it any easier to go through. I'm going through the same emotions myself after losing one of ours. Greyhounds can have genetic dispositions for seizures, they can have medical conditions like tumors, they are more suseptible to environmental hazards due to their low body fat, they can have seizures for no reason at all that medical science can discover. A post mortem might have answered some questions, but it might have shown you nothing. It sounds like you did what any of us would have done faced with the same situation - you made the best choice you could for your grey with the information and advice you had at the time. That's all any of us can do. You might take a look at the thread just started about people's positive stories about their seizure dogs. Some are hard stories like yours, but we give our seizure greys so much love that I like to think they understand, even when that understanding comes from the other side of the Rainbow Bridge. greysmom

Our Libby girl was a seizure dog. We adopted her in August of 04. My husband and I had had Great Danes for years, but after we lost our last boy in May of that year we decided we wanted something smaller. I had been interested in greyhounds for years as my family made trips to the (now closed) Multnomah Greyhound Park for afternoons of racing. Long story short - I talked the hubby into going to a Meet-n-Greet just to take a look up close and in person at the dogs available from the local GPA group. "Just to look," of course. We had no intention of getting another dog so soon after losing Joey. Well, we looked at a bunch of greys, and had decided that - when we were ready! - we might look into adopting more closely. Then we saw Libby! We both just fell in love right away! Her foster mom was pretty clear that she was a seizure dog and she'd have some special needs, but we didn't care. We filled out the form and Libby came home to us two weeks later. She was only the first! We now have three greys, all due to the lovely Libby (race name Everlast) though she's the only one with idiopathic epilepsy. At the time, her seizures were very mild. One every 6-8 weeks or so. They were grand mal but a very light version - she'd seize for almost exactly 10 minutes, with some muscle trembling and paralysis, drooling and staring. She didn't thrash around too much and - thank goodness - they always seemed to happen when we were around. This schedule stayed pretty constant until last summer when she started clustering. We're not sure if her kidney failure started because of the phenobarb, or the phenobarb started the kidney failure, or if they were completely unrelated and just seemed to begin about the same time. But the phenobarb controlled her seizures and she only had one from last July until we lost her to kidney failure at the end of January. Libby was one of the happiest, silliest, sweetest greys we've had and she was simply a joy. Her seizures weren't life altering, at least for her, and she jumped up and was raring to go after about 5 minutes. I would encourage ANYBODY to adopt a seizure dog! Medicine and research has come a long ways, just in the short time we had Libby, and these dogs are often hard to adopt to the casual dog lover - they just don't want to deal with it. But my husband and I wouldn't hesitate to give a home to another one and we probably will at some point! I wish I had a picture, but I haven't quite figured that out yet! greysmom

I've heard some people put a big (as in way too big to eat) rock or two in the bowl to slow them down. The bundt pan thing may work the same way. Or, if he's eating fast because he doesn't want other dogs to get his food, feeding him seperately may help. greysmom

I LOVE the hair curler trick, Tigonie! I wish I'd known about this when mine needed it! greysmom

Thanks. everybody! We started him on OTC dyphenhydramine (like Benedryl but cheaper!) which is a people antihistamine. No results yet but he'll probably have to take it a few days for us to see a change. It could very well be an allergy of some sort as it seems to be seasonal. greysmom

One of my boys came to our house with the same problem. The tip of his tail was completely bald and very easily broken open to bleed when he wagged it - which was (and is!) all the time. It did eventually heal on it's own and now it's completely covered with no more bleeding. This happens sometimes when they are in a kennel a lot and banging it against the bars. I suppose you could try and cover it - be very careful though, if you wrap it too tightly that causes another set of problems. I might try lightly taping it with surgical tape so it stays on. Make sure there's no infection beforehand. If there are any other symptoms (hair loss on other parts of the body, for instance) you might consider checking for thyroid deficiency. greysmom

Thanks, MZH! I wish it were just the hiccups. It actually is more of an inward snort or snore that happens over and over. Sometimes once a second or so for up to ten minutes. It's very disconcerting, almost to the point that we don't want him to play or run since that seems to bring on an attack. GM

One of my boys is having a bad case of the "thumps." In my newest edition of "Care of the Racing and Retired Greyhound" it says this condition is "characterized by a rapid irregular breathing almost resembling a hiccup," which is exactly what VooDoo does, except it sounds a lot more serious in person. It usually happens after playing or when he's excited (again, right in the textbook), and can last a few seconds to up to 10 minutes. The book only says to cool the dog down and make sure his electrolytes and calcium are adequate, and nothing about how to calm the diaphragmatic flutters as they're occuring. Has anyone else experienced this? My husband (who it really distresses the most) made us take VooDoo to the ER vet, and right on cue VooDoo started hiccupping. The vet wasn't impressed and said he hears it all the time and that we shouldn't worry about it. But it is distressing. Sometimes giving him ice cubes works (probably helps cool him down, I guess), and sometimes giving him something chewy to eat works. I don't want to really put anything in his mouth when it's happening cause I'm afraid he'll suck it right into his lungs. Any advice would be appreciated! Thanks!! Greysmom

Thanks, Everyone! Libby is doing OK for the moment. Her BUN is 156 and her creat is 52. We just got her urine sample back and she has no infection and her protein ratio isn't very high (I think 2.9 without getting the paper to look). She isn't getting any extra fluids as she's still drinking (and peeing!) and isn't dehydrated at all. I'll check out the website, Madeara! Thanks again! Mom!

Hi, Everyone! This is my first post on this board and I really need some help and advice! One of my (four!) greyhounds has just been diagnosed with kidney failure. We've got her on a home-cooked diet, an acid reducer, and some dietary supplements on the advice of our internist. Her values are extremely high (as in the vet was astounded Libby was still alive), but there's no structural anomalies on her ultrasound and no infection. She's still in great spirits overall and we want to keep her that way! In doing some web research we/ve run across some holistic supplements at caninekidneyhealth.com (by Five Leaf Pet Pharmacy in Canada) that seems like a miracle cure if you can believe the testimonials. We were wondering if anyone has any experience with this program specifically, and homeopathic treatments in general. We're also investigating acupuncture and other non-traditional medicine. Thanks in advance! I'm looking forward to posting here and talking about my greys! greysmom

Hi, Everyone! This is my first post on this board and I really need some help and advice! One of my (four!) greyhounds has just been diagnosed with kidney failure. We've got her on a home-cooked diet, an acid reducer, and some dietary supplements on the advice of our internist. Her values are extremely high (as in the vet was astounded Libby was still alive). In doing some web research we/ve run across some holistic supplements at caninekidneyhealth.com (by Five Leaf Pet Pharmacy in Canada) that seems like a miracle cure if you can believe the testimonials. We were wondering if anyone has any experience with this program specifically, and homeopathic treatments in general. We're also investigating acupuncture and other non-traditional medicine. Thanks in advance! I'm looking forward to posting here and talking about my greys! greysmom